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I glanced at Maia and Lexie. Their mates had them as transfixed as mine did, and our scents were flaring. We sniggered, knowing our horniness was filtering through our bonds.
As I watched my mates, I wished River and Ryder were back and Nick would come outside. I was loving having girl time, but I’d gone almost an hour without a cuddle. I needed contact with one of my mates to settle me.
Nick was in his tech room. He had so much equipment now the room rivaled Max’s. The guys had scavenged a lot of equipment from abandoned public buildings for him over the last year. He also had a shed we’d built where he and River made kinetic energy devices. After figuring out how the blueprints worked, we’d set up a production facility in town that grew bigger every month. The Palace was also teaching people with existing technical know-how, how to build them. We’d hoped just to hand out instructions, but it had turned out to be too difficult for the average person, and a little dangerous. He and River still made custom pieces here, though, for bigger, more complicated projects. Max often helped, too. Nick was working on the plans for one right now.
“You okay?“ Wolf asked me in the bond.
I heard Nick moving through the house towards me, as if I’d called out to him. No matter how much the guys had worked with him, he found it impossible to be stealthy.
“Yeah,”I answered.“Do not break that warrior pose. It’s really doing it for me. Nick’s coming.”
I felt his chuckle vibrate through me.
“You need a hug?” Nick asked, looking hopeful, as he popped his head out the door. The guys still couldn’t talk in my head the way Wolf could, but our bond had gotten stronger to the point we could send more specific emotions or needs.
“Yeah. I do,” I said. He darted over to me, and I hopped up out of my chair so he could sit down and I promptly settled myself in his lap. As soon as he had his arms around me, I felt better. Maia’s book said it was normal for packs to be touchy feely in the first few years after bonding. I hoped the feeling never faded. I loved how much they needed it as much as I did.
Damon immediately stomped up the stairs, his face full of thunder and the scent of lightning trailing in his wake. We’d banished him to sit under a tree with Bear so we could chat. Not that he’d sat. He’d been standing guard and glaring at the trees surrounding us as if he expected them to pounce on us at any second. I couldn’t wait to see what he’d be like when he had a giggling toddler determined to escape his clutches.
“If Nick’s allowed to be up here, so am I,” he growled.
“Calm your farm, daddy,” Lexie said as she promptly vacated her spot with a grin so Damon could snuggle up with Maia. Bear curled up at Lexie’s feet as she settled into another chair. He immediately started purring and Maia’s whole body softened against him. It helped him relax, too. He was more chill than he used to be, but he always got growly when his daughter was out of sight.
“The kids will be back soon,” I reassured him, and he nodded at me, but his frown remained.
Right on time, Helen and Alexander came around the bend in an electric golf cart. We’d scavenged a bunch of carts from an upmarket golf course we’d come across and used them to get around. Each grandparent was wearing a sling with a baby snuggled in it. Angel was strapped into the back seat.
Damon shifted Maia aside and was up and off the deck before they’d even come to a stop. Maia just laughed, not at all put out to be dumped.
“Sorry, Maia,” he called out over his shoulder when he realized what he’d done. She just waved him off. He grabbed baby Frankie out of the sling as soon as Alexander got out with her, and brought her up to the deck to snuggle back up with her and Maia. Frankie fluttered her baby-blue eyes open, but promptly closed them again when she spotted her dad. She happily went right back to sleep, knowing she was safe, as Damon nuzzled her and cooed nonsense to her. He was an amazing father. All our guys were.
I loved the name they’d chosen, a unisex variation of Frank, Maia’s beloved gramps. She’d made her peace with knowing he’d adopted her and Sam when his omega died. Sam hadn’t quite gotten there yet, having a different relationship with the man who was a brilliant enigma to the rest of us. But we wouldn’t be here today without the decades of work he and Constance put into the Network. It had brought us all together, and Sam acknowledged that.
Helen brought Lucas up to me, while Alexander got Angel out of her seatbelt. Angel came flying up the stairs after her baby brother. He had her absolutely besotted, which was incredibly sweet. She snuggled up next to us and stroked his chubby cheek lightly while he slept, as Nick brushed her hair away from her face lovingly. He’d put it in a braid for her this morning, but it had gotten messy and some had fallen out. Lucas stirred and grabbed Angel’s finger. He was a heavy sleeper, but he always knew when Angel was close. He loved her just as much. They were inseparable.
We’d named Lucas after my Uncle Luke. Maia and I had both wanted to use family names for our babies, to connect them to our histories. We’d both lost so much in the Crash, and in our lives, it felt like an important part of us to keep.
“Stay for a bit,” I said to Helen, and she agreed. She and Alexander had not only embraced our pack, but all three packs. They’d spent so long apart from River and Ryder, they’d been overjoyed to have them back. When they’d learned that many of us were parentless, they’d swooped in. They were now ecstatic to be grandparents, and treated Frankie as much as their own, as Lucas and Angel.
They’d claimed they wanted to give Maia and me a break for an hour this morning, and I’m sure they did, but I knew they also wanted time with the grandkids. We were lucky. Our kids would never want for love in the way many of our pack had. Between our three packs, Helen, Alexander, and GG, we sometimes had to fight for a cuddle. We had no need for prams because there were always so many people around wanting to carry them. We needed more kids to keep everyone busy.
Nick’s hand unconsciously slid down and rubbed over my belly, and Lexie narrowed her eyes at me with that sixth sense she always had. She was becoming too much like GG, or maybe just enough like GG. There were worse people to grow into. GG liked to pop up unexpectedly at our house. I’d walk into the kitchen and find her baking with Angel, or we’d open the door in the morning and find a knitted present on the porch for one of us, but I didn’t mind. She had an open invitation, and she was never intrusive.
I just smiled at Lexie, and she winked at me. She wouldn’t out me until I was ready. I wasn’t hiding my pregnancy, but I wanted to tell Angel first and my scent had only just changed. An unexpected heat had hit me a week ago. It seemed my body liked to spring them on me. My guys had been ecstatic. Especially Wolf. He’d been enthusiastic in his attempts to breed me, again.
A wistful expression crossed Lexie’s face as she watched us, though. She’d been overjoyed to find out her birth control implant had held up through the two heats she’d had, about six months apart, but I wondered if that had changed. She’d been a force to be reckoned with over the last year, getting people onside with our vision for the world and making the impossible happen. Maia and I, and even Sadie, had just followed in her wake. In complete awe of her.
Sadie was also pregnant at the moment, but she hadn’t let it slow her down at all. Much like Maia and I hadn’t. It turned out all omegas needed to be incredibly fertile was a true mate, or four, and a heat. No genetic manipulations or barking required.
“You all make it look so easy,” Lexie said to me. “You and Maia have gotten so much done while pregnant and now carrying around babies. It hasn’t slowed Sadie down, either. You’ve helped set up this farm and the Palace, taught sessions there, helped with the town trading hub, and held the hands of the returning omegas. You amaze me.”
I shook my head. “Helped, being the key word there. We couldn’t have done any of it without you leading the way, Lexie. You’re our captain.”
She’d inspired so many of the omegas coming back into the world. Not just us. And she’d powered through every obstacle in their way to help them.
“What she said,” Maia added, with a head nod in my direction and a wink at Lexie.
“Women were giving birth in fields, and getting on with their lives, for a long time before modern conveniences came along,” Helen said. She had a gentle expression on her face as she watched Lexie. I knew she’d find her later and talk to her about whatever was on her mind.
